First of all, my heart is breaking.
Kansas City is a wonderful community, and on Wednesday it was filled with thousands upon thousands of excited Missourians. These fans came together to forget about their differences and join in a celebration filled with pride and joy. But now, that moment will always be defined by the individual or individuals who opened fire after a rally celebrating the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory, a hideous act of violence.
Now, that moment will always be defined by the individual or individuals who opened fire after a rally celebrating the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory, a hideous act of violence.
Union Station, which is essentially where this shooting occurred, is primarily a museum and a gathering place. It is where, at three different times in recent Kansas City history, fans have gathered to honor the amazing accomplishments of our professional football team.
And I am terribly sad.
I worked closely with the Kansas City Police Department for a decade as an assistant prosecutor and elected prosecutor in Kansas City. Led by Police Chief Stacey Graves, these are top-notch professionals. Graves is a veteran of the KCPD, and I am confident her department will figure out who did this, and why. The perpetrators will be prosecuted effectively and fairly. Jean Peters Baker, the prosecutor for Jackson County, Missouri, has decades of experience in that office. She will bring justice to this city. These are people who know what they are doing.
For now, my friends in Kansas City are reeling. They are experiencing both heartbreak and anger. Anger that someone, anyone, would ruin this moment of profound community. A moment of collective joy. That is a terrible crime.
Missouri has some of the most open, liberal gun laws in the country. Anyone can carry a long gun, anywhere. Police departments in urban areas are challenged by the laws, because they limit what law enforcement officers can do if they see citizens carrying weapons of war openly on the streets of cities like St. Louis and Kansas City.
Meanwhile, the Missouri state Legislature has been dominated by rural leaders — Republican leaders who think guns are OK because they are thinking of them solely in a rural context, and not about what happens when you mix gun violence with a densely concentrated urban area. The damage these weapons can do, especially long guns that can be fired rapidly, is catastrophic.
Today, we have witnessed another sad chapter in America’s love affair with weapons designed to kill and maim a lot of humans in a short amount of time. And I don’t care if anyone tells me I’m being too political about guns in this terrible moment.
If not now, when?
The majority of people in this country want to see something change. It has become dangerous to go to school, to go to work, to go to church. Now we add to that list. It is now dangerous to go to a football team’s Super Bowl parade.
It is just unconscionable that we have allowed guns to have this much power — and inflict this much death — in our beautiful, freedom-loving country.
This is an adapted excerpt from the February 14 episode of “Deadline: White House.”
Claire McCaskill
Claire McCaskill, a Democrat, was the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate from Missouri. She is currently an MSNBC and NBC News political analyst.